Flood risk and social deprivation

The aim was to assess whether there is an inequality in the distribution of populations living in areas at flood risk in each IMD decile, nationally in England and within subsamples. This is an updated analysis of social deprivation and flood risk. They published the previous analyses in 2006 and 2020. Since then, the data sets used have been updated, including the National Assessment of Flood Risk (NaFRA) and the re-release of the Indices of Multiple Deprivation (IMD) in 2025.

The analysis shows that:

• inequalities in the scale of exposure to flooding remain in England
• inequalities exist for flooding from rivers and the sea, and surface water flooding
• coastal communities experience some of the worst flood risk inequality
• inequalities are also found in urban areas
• no inequality in the scale of exposure to flooding was found in rural areas